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Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 2009

In her eerie and hair-raising thriller Skin, Mo Hayder trails her two unforgettable protagonists as they race to staunch a rising tide of blood in a sweltering port town. When the decomposing body of a young woman is found, the wounds on her wrists suggest an open-and-shut case of suicide. But Jack Caffery is not so sure. Other apparent suicides are cropping up, and they all have a connection to Elf's Grotto, a nearly bottomless network of flooded quarries just outside the city. Caffery begins to suspect a shadowy and sinister predator, someone—or something— that can disappear into darkness and slip into houses unseen. Working alongside Caffery is rough-and-tough police diver Flea Marley, but while pursuing her investigation, she stumbles upon something far too close to home that no one—not even Caffery—can help her face. Skin is a penetrating dissection of family, friendships, and the evil that can tear them apart—or bind them together. Devious and disturbing, it introduces one of Hayder's most horrifying villains yet.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Det. Insp. Jack Caffery of Bristol's Major Crime Investigation Unit looks into the case of Misty Kitson, a footballer's wife who vanished from rehab, in Hayder's chilling thriller, which picks up a few days after the grisly climax of 2008's Ritual. Caffery is distracted by the apparent suicide of a young man who he's convinced shows signs of mutilation similar to the victims of muti, the African black magic that figured in the previous book. Meanwhile, Sgt. Phoebe Flea Marley, a police diver, is busy exploring a series of flooded quarries in search of a missing woman, but her mind is elsewhere, too: the discovery that her brother, Thom, plays a vital role in Misty's much publicized disappearance. After two more alleged suicides, Caffery isn't sure if he's imagining a connection to muti, or if the answer is closer to home but no less deadly. Hayder captures the claustrophobia of Flea's dives in unsettling detail and continues to build on her two damaged heroes. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

*Starred Review* Tired of all those lame vampire and goth horror books? Ready for something really scary? This is it. Easily today’s best writer of visceral and elemental horror, Hayder handles her genre specialty in a way guaranteed to creep out even the strongest of heart. No Lovecraftian excesses here. Hayder writes about monsters that could be real, yanked from some dank recess of the id. This combo of police procedural and African mythology continues the story from her earlier novel Ritual (2008) and marks the fourth appearance of Detective Inspector Jack Caffery and forensic diver “Flea” Marley. The enigmatic monster dubbed the Tokoloshe is also back and intertwined into a murder mystery that may, or may not, involve the supernatural. What it definitely does involve is someone or something that likes skin—especially when it’s separated from its original owner. Thus far, Hayder has been too edgy to achieve widespread recognition, but this just could be the book that launches her beyond cult favorite to mainstream star. --Elliott Swanson --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Perfect Paperback
• Publisher: Non Basic Stock Line (November 1, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553813900
• ISBN-13: 978-0553813906
• Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 1.3 x 7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.5 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "If you stop looking at death, death will stop sending out its handmaiden to find you.", December 22, 2009

By 

Luan Gaines "luansos" (Dana Point, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Skin (Hardcover)

Mo Hayder strikes again with a new thriller, calling on familiar protagonists from Ritual, DI Jack Caffrey of Bristol's Major Crime Investigation Unit and Police underwater search unit lead Sergeant Flea Marley. Having run into one another on a prior investigation that introduced the Tokoloshe and ancient African rituals called muti, the pair cross paths once more. While Caffrey remains unconvinced in the resolution of the ritual murders in the last case and suspicious about a string of missing local women, Flea is diving Elf's Grotto, a network of flooded quarries outside the city in search of the body of a missing celebrity wife escaped from rehab, discovering instead a mutilated pet. The spark between Caffrey and Marley is rekindled, although each is off on other pursuits in this novel, a twisted skein of false starts, apparent suicides and a family problem that sets Flea spinning.

To add to the thrills, Hayder throws in a particularly dark figure, a surgeon obsessed with collecting the skin of female patients. Although his connection to recent events seems remote, eventually the focus turns to the surgeon's rural home and an ethical conundrum for Caffrey. Meanwhile, Flea has her own ethical issues, caught in an increasingly difficult situation and an uncomfortable contretemps with the brother who got her into trouble in the last novel. On parallel tracks, both cases are fascinating, bizarre and gruesome, Hayder never flinching from the details of human depravity and the methodology of serial murders. As their paths converge in a shocking ending, the author proves once again her genius when it comes to the dark side. DI Caffrey and Sergeant Marley are certain to meet again in another explosive adventure, but Hayder will surely line the trail with a series of gruesome details.

The thriller is Hayder's genre, a clever juxtaposition of regular police investigation with the realities of the autopsy room and the infinite varieties of serial murder, none for the faint of heart. In equal proportions of mystery and gore, the banal takes on a new dimension when a twisted mind is at play- and there is always one behind the scenes in Hayder's work. Like a vampire hunter, Hayder is fearless in the face of human depravity, a connoisseur of the macabre, by definition ever an outrageous experience for loyal fans. Luan Gaines/2009.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Ultimately Dissatisfying, April 12, 2010

By 

Mick McAllister - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Skin (Hardcover)

Skin is an up and down ride. Having just finished James Doss' certifiably worst novel, The Widow's Revenge, I cut Hayder a lot of slack. But ultimately, this is not a satisfying novel. Hayder has written three stellar mysteries -- Birdman, The Treatment, and The Devil of Nanking. Her latest three books have been strained -- trying too hard to gross us out and tipping moral centers a bit past acceptable.

For starters, no one will be able to follow this book if they haven't read Ritual (also not very good, though). There is simply too much you have to accept as given without the events of the previous novel. Secondly, even with the previous books to introduce you to the detectives (Caffrey in three, Markey in one), it's very hard to accept them as "the good guys." They don't draw much sympathy, and there are enough real good guys around (Markey's colleagues, Caffrey's pathologist) that we wonder why we should care about these two.

Next, one subplot is so revolting that it cannot come to a moral or ethical resolution (and, tellingly, it remains unresolved at the end). Suffice it to say that watching Markey spend most of the novel trying to decide what to do about a dead body in her car's trunk is neither amusing nor terribly interesting. Eventually, the situation develops to a point where we have some sympathy for the detective, but even so the problem remains insoluble and Markey's personal dilemma doesn't feel likely, nor do we identify with her supposedly hard choices.

Finally, there IS no serial killer. Since the other reviews have provided what I consider spoilers, I won't tread too carefully here. While it is true that the killer is collecting skin from victims, the killings themselves are not motivated by this but by the need to cover up his crimes. The killer himself, as another reviewer has mentioned, is something of a letdown, not because he isn't very interesting (I very much appreciate writers like Carol O'Connell, Val McDairmid and Elizabeth George for their insistence that serial killers are not, at bottom, very interesting people), but because finding and apprehending him is such a no-brainer.

And tellingly, the last murder makes absolutely no sense, because it doesn't protect his identity (the victim knows nothing about his crimes) and he doesn't violate the corpse. The victim is actually killed by Hayder in a bold-faced act of deus ex machina. Which she then reverses -- the cheapest of fictional ploys, in my view.

Hayder may have spent her capital in three excellent books. All three depend for their effect on a horrific and persuasive look at humankind at their worst. That's not much of an achievement; what made the books memorable was that she did this from a moral perspective that was completely free of sensationalism and titillation. Things went off the tracks with Pig Island, which kept the horror, lost the objectivity, and wallowed a bit in perversity. There was a lesson to learn from Thomas Harris' rapid degeneration into his own nastiness, and Hayder missed it. Ritual and Skin are headed in the right direction, but what appears to be left, now that the dust is settling, is neither compelling nor illuminating.

I'll probably read the next book in the Ritual/Skin trilogy, just to see what happens to Markey. But if that book leaves me hanging, I'll let go.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The Revenge of the Tokoloshe!, March 17, 2010

By 

C. ANZIULEWICZ "Chuck Anziulewicz" (Spring Hill, WV USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Skin (Hardcover)

The jacket notes for Mo Hayder's latest novel read, "Skin is a penetrating dissection of family, friendships, and the evil that can tear them apart--or bind them together. Devious and disturbing, it introduces one of Hayder's most horrifying villains yet: A man obsessed with human skin." The part about family, friendships, and evil is pretty much on the mark. And "Skin" is indeed devious and disturbing, as we have come to expect from Ms. Hayder. But one of her most horrifying villains yet? Not by a long shot!


I'll give the author credit: "Skin" is definitely a page-turner, just like all of her previous books. But compared to "Birdman" and "The Treatment" (both excellent), this new novel is ... well, rather tepid. The abovementioned villain ultimately comes off as a bit pathetic and certainly not fleshed out very well. Along the way are a couple of subplots, one involving one of Jack Caffery's colleagues and the mess her brother has gotten himself into, and the other involving that weird little ape-man, the Tokoloshe, featured in Mo Hayder's previous book, "Ritual."


For readers who have never immersed themselves in the pungent charms of one of Ms. Hayder's novels, "Skin" is not the place to start, especially since the story begins just a few days after the conclusion of "Ritual." Instead, read "Birdman" and then "The Treatment." And if that's all you ever experience by Ms. Hayder, you can consider yourself thoroughly entertained. Compared to those first two works, "Skin" was disappointing. I'm being generous by giving it three stars.